Ships and Knits ……Jan. 16, 2004

Yesterday, I traveled down to Portsmouth, NH to participate in the NETA Afghan Joining Party for the SHIPS program.  SHIPS provides knitted hats for the winters and cool ties for the summer along with other things.  The afghan will be raffled off at the Spa in February and the funds will go towards postage for the knitted items.

Many New England bloggers were there and we shared great food, good laughs, learned some new knitting and spinning tips from each other, along with a fun fiber stash draw.  I was the lucky recipient of this great grab bag from Julia.  Ten lovely skeins of Sylvan Spirit from the Green Mountain Spinnery.  You can see pictures of our joining party here.

Knits
A new lot of Peruvian Highland Wool at Elann went on sale Thursday.  I pulled out books and patterns and quickly had lots of projects, costing lots of money dancing in my head.  As I looked at the total for all of the yarn that I wanted, I almost choked and quickly started rethinking….LOL.  One of the projects that I had been contemplating is the Ribby Cardi from Chicknits.  I was thinking a nice charcoal grey and then I remembered the stash of Lambs Pride that I had sitting in my barn (for over 3 years) and decided to pull that out and save some money. (What a novel concept..hehe) 

I have never worked with Lambs pride before and I was pleasantly suprised at how nice it knits and how yummy it feels.  The ribby cardi works up quickly and is a great, mindless knit.  The body of the sweater will be in the dark charcoal and the sleeves will be knit up in a nice light grey color.  I haven’t knit a full sized sweater for moi in a long time, so this will be fun.

Soooo, as all of the projects were dancing in my head……..then looking at the price tag and remembering my resolution for 2005 of self control and self discipline, I put all of the projects back on the virtual shelf and settled for just one project  in this lovely shade of Red Maple.  I did manage to toss in a couple of skeins of sock yarn though…..but those will be Christmas presents for next year…..so this is a good thing, right??  LOL

Now, I am not on a yarn diet as some others are……but I really am truly trying to control my impulses and show a little self control and discipline this year, in all areas of my life…..
Maybe I will use up my stash AND lose those extra pounds!

I have also been plugging along on the XO vest from Folk Vests.  I love the pattern, but I am still not in love with the Black Water Abbey Yarn.  It gives great definition to the pattern, but it is very scratchy.  I am still holding out until I give the entire vest a good soaking, though, before forming a complete opinion.  It won’t be something worn against the skin, so I am sure that it will be fine :-).

The AKC Eukanuba Invitational

The Eukanuba Invitational Dog show was held this weekend in Florida.  It was televised on the Animal Planet/Discovery Channel.  I don’t get that station here, however my daughter was kind enough to tape it for me, so we will watch it this week.

Little Miss Dora will start her training for the conformation ring this week.  Maybe you will see her shining face at the Invitational in a few years!